For second successive year
The Portuguese duo of João Ferreira and Filipe Palmeiro defended their crown at the rescheduled Teruel-based Baja Spain Aragón with a comfortable victory on Sunday.
The Toyota Gazoo Racing SA Hilux Evo crew were the class of the 58-car field on the fifth round of both the FIA World and European Baja Cups. They won the first two selective sections on Saturday and finished fourth on the last stage to secure victory with a winning margin of 3min 53.4sec. The win also gave Ferreira valuable points towards his FIA World Baja Cup challenge.
Ferreira said: “Another victory with SVR. I’m super, super happy. The team deserved it. It was a very demanding race for all of us. The terrain was quite tough, the competition was very difficult. Try to push sometimes was difficult but I am grateful to the team and my sponsors that we could take the win.”
Luis Portela belied his lack of competition in the Ultimate class to deliver a sensational second place with navigator Carlos Jorge Mendes in an Overdrive Racing Toyota Hilux. The Portuguese was quickest on the Prologue and finished second on the last two stages to claim the runner-up spot, although he was not registered for either Baja Cup.
Toyota Gazoo Racing SA had two cars on the podium with young South African Saood Variawa teaming up with Charan Moore to finish third and boost his chances of success in the FIA World Baja Cup.
Cristina Gutiérrez recently left the official Dacia Sandriders team that competes in the W2RC and has joined the Santana Racing Team. She and navigator Marc Sola guided their Santana Zahara T1 to fourth place.
Francisco Barreto and Paulo Fiuza collected valuable FIA World Baja Cup points for finishing fifth in an SVR Toyota, while Gonçalo Guerreiro and Joel Lutas were the runaway winners of the Challenger category in their sixth-placed Nasser Racing Team Taurus Evo Max, but were not chasing Baja Cup points.
All fifty-eight crews made the start with 13 chasing points in the FIA World Baja Cup and 16 tackling the FIA European Baja Cup.
Behind seventh-placed Cristian Baumgart (Toyota), Dutchman Pim Klaassen was the highest-placed driver in the FIA European Baja Cup. He and Leander Pienaar finished eighth in a Red-Lined DKR Evo GTR. Their closest European Baja Cup rivals were the Polish duo of Maríusz Wiatr and Łukasz Łaskawiec (Ford) in 10th overall and the Lithuanian Gurtam Toyota Gazoo Racing Baltics pairing of Benediktas Vanagas and Aisvydas Paliukenas in 12th.
The South Racing Can-Am Team’s Mitchel van den Brink and Bart van Heun took full advantage of the absence of the injured Hamed Al-Wahaibi to claim maximum Challenger points in the FIA World Baja Cup. They were classified in 11th overall.
“Happy with the result,” said Van den Brink. “It was an amazing race. We enjoyed it. The last run was quite tricky with a lot of stones on the track. Besides that, the team did a great job.”
A solid run earned the French father and daughter pairing of Lionel and Lucie Baud 12th place and valuable Ultimate category points for the FIA World Baja Cup in the first of the X-Raid Minis.
A disappointing weekend after a bad result on the Prologue saw Dania Akeel finish 16th in the second of the Overdrive Racing Toyotas after she broke a rear shock absorber. Team-mate Yazeed Al-Rajhi had been running in second overall before the start of the final morning with stand-in navigator Dennis Zenz, but he suffered an oil leak on to the brakes and was forced to retire his Toyota.
One of the star-performing pairings was Guillaume de Mévius and Mathieu Baumel in their X-Raid Mini. They led for much of the first stage before rolling and losing 45 minutes on the first stage but fought back to win the last stage on Sunday.
Rio Seco Racing’s Rúben Rodrigues took full advantage of problems for his closest European rivals, including team-mates Paulo Rodrigues and Fausto Mota, to secure valuable points towards his SSV challenge. Marek Kubicek (Taurus) topped the Challenger crews in the FIA European Baja Cup from the series-leading Dinís Rogeira (Can-Am).
Four teams battled it out for supremacy in the Stock category with three of them chasing FIA World Cup points. Fernando Barreiros and José Marques came out on top on the Prologue and all three stages in their Isuzu D-Max from the Saudi duo of Majed Al-Thunayyan and Omar Al-Lahim.
Andrei Halabarodzka and Aleksei Ignatov were third and claimed the spoils in the FIA European Baja Cup. Former category leaders Al-Mashna Al-Shammeri and Abdullah Al-Shammeri brought up the rear of the field in their Nissan Patrol and took fourth in Stock.
A Prologue of 6.48km determined the starting positions for the first selective section on Saturday morning. Surprisingly, Luis Portela clocked the quickest time of 4min 11.2sec in his Toyota Hilux to claim the bragging rights from De Mévius, Al-Rajhi, Ferreira and the Challenger front-running Guerreiro.
Variawa initially earned the win before being handed a 30-second time penalty for a route infringement. Ferreira also lost out on second place with a similar penalty.
Ferreira was handed road-opening duties for the first 151.07km stage from De Mévius, Portela, Baud and Santiago Carnicer.
The starting position failed to deter the Portuguese and he won the stage by 28.1 seconds from Variawa with Cristina Gutiérrez replacing Edu Blanco and running strongly in her new Santana Zahara T1 to finish third.
De Mévius led for much of the way before losing 45 minutes over the final 25km after an accident. The Belgian said: “We showed that the car can be fast but I did a small mistake. We rolled the car on a slow corner and we got stuck, so we were upside down, stuck, waiting for someone to push, to pull us on to four wheels again.”
Portela was handed a four-minute time penalty for missing a waypoint on the first stage, Vanagas incurred a five-minute speeding penalty and Gameiro suffered time-consuming fuel pump issues.
Guerreiro continued to shine in the Challenger category, Afonso Oliveira topped the SSVs and Barreiros drew first blood in the Stock section.
The longer second stage ran for 180.08km and Ferreira continued to lead the way with the quickest time. That enabled the Toyota Hilux Evo driver to reach the Teruel night halt with a 3min 10.4sec cushion over second-placed Al-Rajhi.
The Saudi’s Overdrive team-mate Luis Portela held third, ahead of Gutiérrez, Variawa and Francisco Barreto.
Guerriero dominated the Challenger category once again to lead overnight from Van Den Brink and Henk Klaassen, with Van den Brink losing some time in the dust.
Oliveira increased his cushion over Ruben Rodrigues and Filipe Lopes in the SSVs after Fernando Alvarez lost time and was later handed an additional 10-minute of time penalties for having a missing wheel on his Can-Am. Al-Helai’s hopes of scoring valuable FIA World Baja Cup dashed when he too was docked 10-minutes for two separate offences for failing to allow a rival to overtake.
There was a single pass through the 151.07km stage on Sunday. De Mévius clocked the fastest time, despite losing his damaged bonnet in the wind, but Ferreira did enough to secure victory with fourth. Guerreiro and Oliveira sealed victories in their respective Challenger and SSV categories.
Action resumes in the FIA European Baja Cup at next weekend’s Baja TT Sharish Gin Reguengos de Monsaraz-Mourão (September 17th-20th).
2026 Baja Spain Aragón – final result:
1. João Ferreira (POR)/Filipe Palmeiro (POR) Toyota Hilux Evo 6hr 24min 18.4sec*
2. Luis Portela (POR)/Carlos Jorge Mendes (POR) Toyota Hilux Evo 6hr 28min 11.8sec
3. Saood Variawa (RSA)/Charan Moore (RSA) Toyota Hilux Evo 6hr 29min 49.4sec*
4. Cristina Gutiérrez (ESP)/Marc Sola (ESP) Santana Zahara T1 6hr 30min 43.1sec
5. Francisco Barreto (POR)/Paulo Fiuza (POR) Toyota Hilux Evo 6hr 33min 45.5sec*
6. Gonçalo Guerreiro (POR)/Joel Lutas (POR) Taurus Evo Max 6hr 34min 19.8sec
7. Cristian Baumgart (BRA)/Luis Felipe Eckel (BRA) Toyota Hilux Evo 6hr 35min 53.8sec
8. Pim Klaassen (NED)/Leander Pienaar (RSA) Red-Lined DKR Evo GTR 6hr 36min 12.2sec+
9. Santiago Carnicer (ESP)/Sergio Peinado (ESP) Toyota Hilux 6hr 37min 47.9sec
10. Maríusz Wiatr (POL)/Łukasz Łaskawiec (POL) Ford F-150 Evo 6hr 38min 59.5sec+
